


The X Spies

by Frangipanidownunder



Category: The X-Files
Genre: AU, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-10
Updated: 2019-06-10
Packaged: 2020-04-23 22:08:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19159942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frangipanidownunder/pseuds/Frangipanidownunder
Summary: Five headcanons for if Mulder and Scully were spies.





	The X Spies

1

He sees the tiny camera eye protruding from the edge of her handbag before he sees the covered freckles on her classical face and the fear in her big blue eyes.

“Who did you tick off to get this detail, Scully?”

“Actually, I’m looking forward to working with you.” At least she sounds convincing, even if she looks so green she might be radioactive.

He watches her during their first case, taking her little notes, trying so hard to hide her clandestine photographing and secretive phone calls. The way she covets the thing up Billy Miles’ nose, pockets the mysterious dirt. The walls of motels are thin. He closes his eyes and listens to her movements. She’s light on her feet, precise with her movements – the way she closes the doors and drawers, the three-minute showers, apart from that longer one when he listened to her small moans only half-hidden by the rush of water. Then there’s the timing of the calls, always 10pm. On the dot. Checking in.

Paranoia and distrust are his real partners. Dana Scully is just a front.

2

He’s surprised during the second case that she rescues him. She’s got a fierce look in her eye, a determination that he’d seen develop in Bellefleur but that has grown exponentially. He almost wants to trust her but his brain is mush and he needs to keep his distance. In the dead of night, he surmises she only got him back because she needs the information he discovers. To work against him. To keep him from exposing them. But Deep Throat told him what he needed to hear. Dana Scully can carry on writing her reports and he’ll keep showing her that the puppet masters she’s dancing for are the true enemy.

When she tells him during the latest case about the strange bacteria that could be extraterrestrial he can’t help but feel it’s all a set-up. But then she tells him she’s sorry for never believing him, for taking science as absolute and there’s such an honesty in her face that he’s reeling. She saves him again. Then they’re forced apart. And he feels gratitude, not relief.

3

When she finds him in Arecibo he feels the shift like something seismic. It makes no sense that she’s spying on him any more. She’s put herself on the line too many times for it to be just a job for her. He wants to ask her, but he’s afraid. Afraid to find out who she really is and why he feels like he does. When she’s taken, he’s out of his mind with fear and doubt. When she’s returned he resolves never to lose her again.

They track on for a good long time, professional, but every so often one or other them opens up. He knows she still submits reports. But she hasn’t taken photos for a while. He wonders if she extracted herself or if she’s been ordered to take a step back.

When the videotapes cause a deep psychosis, he’s desperate. Desperate because she’s drowning in her own delusions. Desperate because she’s so close to a catastrophic breakdown that might put both of them at risk. When she accuses him of being one of the men who abducted her, his insides wrench. It’s Mrs Scully who finds a way in to her tormented mind. And he’ll be forever grateful for her gentleness, her love.

4

She’s going to die and he doesn’t know if it’s because of him or because of her bosses. It’s easier for him to believe he’s to blame for her cancer. It burns deeper, setting off a more exquisite sting of guilt than if she were to succumb to the unknown powers that control her. She thinks it’s Skinner. Maybe that’s who she’s been reporting to all along. Maybe she feels justified in flaming him now, a final fuck you before…

But she doesn’t die. He finds the miracle cure. But it comes at a price. He’s sold his soul to the devil. Again.

5

After Antarctica, he puts distance between them. He’s forced to with the return of Fowley. Scully closes off. He’s relieved for the most part, but he misses her. Misses the Scully she’d become, the Scully he imagined in those quiet 2am moments there might be a future with. When they play house, he suspects she’s reporting again. Her behaviour in Milagro leaves him angry but he nearly loses her once more and that shoot of something, something lighter and more hopeful than he’s ever known, grows again. She plays baseball with him and he knows she knows how to hit. But he enjoys her feigned ignorance. Lets the shoot sprout until it warms his chest.

When he starts hearing voices, her voice, it sends him mad. She’s so heartbreakingly earnest in her fight to free him from this hell, but like the blame and guilt he’s always craved, half of him wants to stay trapped in the burning fire.

When she finds him, she pleads with him to help her and in between her words he hears her thoughts. Charlie. Charlie. Why is she thinking about her brother? Her tear splashes on his skin. It cleanses his thoughts and for a weighted moment he sees with absolute clarity. He understands why she’s been doing it, who she’s been protecting, where her loyalties have always been. To her family. To her younger brother. He’s been her blindspot like Samantha has been his. He’s not sure if Charlie is still alive, but he stands with her help and he’s determined to find out.

He can’t let her leave so he follows her down the hallway and asks her to come back in. She’s frightened. Being vulnerable hurts her. He understands. It takes a long time but it all comes out. How Charlie was caught hacking computers when he was a teen and was lured into the shady world of government espionage. He came to her one day, frightened out of his mind, and she agreed to help him. She joined the FBI. She wrote reports. She tried to stop but they threatened Charlie every time. He understands, he says. He gets it.

And then he tells her. Tells her the truth, about his connections. It feels so good to let it all out. The tension leaves his body and he feels soft-limbed and loose. The more they talk, the more they see the patterns unfold, the similarities and it’s a blinding light of epiphany when they realise they’ve both been working for the same agency all these years. Her contact is Henry. His is Paige. They were the children of Illegals during the cold war. First generation Americans selling government secrets to the highest bidders.

Working out how to extract themselves goes well until they return to Bellefleur. As he is pulled into the light he knows it was a mistake to come back.


End file.
